David Lazar

by Robert Kalich

  “Elizabeth, maybe you’re right. Debbie Turner might have been correct for being disappointed in me. I can see that now. The more money I made the more depersonalized and disconnected I became.”

  Every once in a while, I’d stop, give Elizabeth a chance to get a few words in. Ask her what she thought. After our first couple of months together, she had a strong opinion on whatever it was we were chattering about.

  “David, do you have any idea how much time you spend talking about those women from your past? And you describe each one of them as a ten. It’s enough already, understand?”

  As Elizabeth began to relax with me, she would say a lot more than, “David, I need to feed the cats.”

  And then, in our fourth month together, Elizabeth started to almost give me a smile. A quick kiss now and then, sometimes a brief hug or a light touch to my shoulder. We didn’t go out much. One of the few times we left Elizabeth’s apartment was that first date when we had dinner at the Thai restaurant. After that, we went to maybe four or five movies. For the most part, we would just stay at her place and talk.

  Elizabeth is almost six feet tall, a totem pole. Intense wide-set blue-green eyes. Cheekbones like Vanilla Ice. What was she like at the very beginning? A character in a gothic tale. Gaunt and harrowed. What attributes did I perceive in Elizabeth on first look? She had distress on her brow. Pain in her lusterless stringy hair. There were patches of skin visible on her scalp. She would break into tears if I as much as mentioned, “Tell me about your family.” She’d start to shake if I inquired on anything close to intimate. She had a mournful countenance 24/7. A voice that seemed to almost be crying. Still does. There was an enormous quantity of self-consciousness. She seemed to have a coiled electric current running through her body. She was always covering up her chest. Clasping her elbows. Her forearms. Rocking. It made me feel as if she were a bleeding, gushing, open wound. And that proved out. We remained strictly platonic. Believe me, Elizabeth Dunn was not an ingénue. No way. Yet, she had sand, earth, and grit in her. Not anything less than a complete wound of a person. She was as authentic as winter can be when it’s igloo cold. Our friendship evolved from, “I’ve never been happy one day in my life” to become so much better than sexual treasures with Leslie, my happiness pill days with D.T., Amy Cho’s lyrical yoga chants and sweetest of nothings, or all the money bags I’ve buried.

  It took Elizabeth a long while before she was comfortable with me. She would hold my hand, which for me was wellbeing. When we attended films, I would put my arm around her shoulder. Anything more just didn’t take place. And then, one day, somehow, miraculously, I broke through. From then on, the two of us were chatterboxes.

  “David. Tell me about your handicapping. Start from the very beginning.”

  “I started back in 1970 when I was at the Department of Welfare taking home less than $200 a week and had moved back in with my parents. I owed a ton of money. I started to think what it was that I knew best. That could change my life. I knew books, but financially, books were a joke.

  “‘No one asked you to be a novelist, Lazar!’ Norman Rosten, the poet laureate of Brooklyn, told me one night when I cried to him.

  “‘If you want to continue writing novels, Lazar, do it because you must. Not because there’s a pot of gold at the end of the journey.’”

  I know that all of this might seem terribly self-indulgent, but Elizabeth was obviously interested in my life. She’d always say, “I’d rather talk about your life, David. There’s not much to talk about in mine.”

  I told her about narrowing my betting focus to college hoops. “I began to see that over a college basketball season, some games were out of whack with my own power ratings.”

  “Please go slowly, David. I don’t know anything about this kind of stuff.”

  “I don’t want to bore you, Elizabeth. But the bottom line was I started to think that instead of paying vigorish, I could wipe out the juice. Perhaps even have a percentage in my favor like, say, a bank does or an insurance company or for that matter, as Las Vegas casinos do every time some sucker rolls the dice. Believing that I had discovered something, I began to think that I could win.

  “I began scribbling down rules to follow. Things like ‘maximize’ and ‘minimize.’ Money management. Protect every dollar. Never give in to a number. Stop being a gambler and become a handicapper. Think shorts. Learn every home court. Revise my power ratings every week. Go to war. I’ll show her...I’ll show her...I’ll show Leslie, Elizabeth, was right out there, marching point.”

  “Before you go on, David. Explain to me what’s a short? And what’s vigorish?”

  “Vigorish is juice. Commission. The charge of the bookmaker for handling bets. The term originated in England in the eighteenth century.” When I finished explaining, I went on to describe my desperation, my determination.

  “I started to save cash, one dollar at a time. I didn’t have enough money to go to McDonald’s. I was in debt over $40,000. Do you have any idea how much $40,000 was back then? If it weren’t for my parents, living rent free, I would never have had a chance. I started to put aside five to ten dollars each week. I owed banks, finance companies, my parents, my friends. I owed Ron Nevins $6,200. I had been such a screw-up, Elizabeth, that even now, I get chills talking about it.

  “All I did in those two years was pay off the interest on what I owed finance companies and take Debbie Turner to lunch. But I was trying to change my life. After almost two years of scrounging, I had scraped together a $250 bankroll. I was ready to make my first wager. The first bet I made was for $25. I won.

  “During the years Debbie Turner and I lived together, I became established. People like Solomon Lepidus and Nathan Rubin started to take me seriously. Started to call me ‘The Handicapper.’”

  “Nathan Rubin? You never mentioned him.”

  “I met Rubin through Solomon. In a way Nathan Rubin was my mentor. The man was brilliant. And I don’t throw that word around lightly. Rubin was an orphan out of the swamplands of Florida. He somehow had touched toenails with Meyer Lansky, the infamous Meyer Lansky. And the two of them started working together. They had a great deal in common. Both men were hungry for the green. By the time I met Rubin he was the owner of Metropolitan Cable, funeral parlors, parking lots, blocks of commercial real estate in lower Manhattan and several high rises in Manhattan. Rubin ran his empire like a mathematician, and when the feds put heat on him, he stepped down from the cable company and gave one of his employees the opportunity to run it. This fellow knew nothing about anything other than Nathan’s funeral parlors, but he took over. Then, when Nathan Rubin’s son was ready to be CEO, the guy disappeared. With Nathan Rubin, everything was a proposition. He would give you something which seemed to be completely in your favor. To him, everyone was a sucker. His proposition bets were a true thing of beauty. Solomon Lepidus must have blown ten million dollars in his lifetime to Rubin.

  “Never once did Solomon see any of those proposition bets for what they were. Few did. Every trap Rubin set seemed like a great opportunity.”

  “What did he look like?”

  “Only a woman would ask that, Liz. Rubin was five foot five with white hair, featherweight shoulders, pearly white teeth that he removed each night ‘til the day he died. He kept those teeth of his in a water glass, Liz, the same way my parents did. I must’ve been to Nathan Rubin’s Park Avenue triplex a thousand times and filled that glass with kosher salt into which I put his store-bought teeth.” I paused. “Nathan Rubin always had a crease in his trousers, and that crease could cut you.” I stopped again. “I never loved him like I loved Solomon Lepidus, Liz, but I respected him a whole lot more.”

  I would climb Elizabeth Dunn’s flights of stairs just about every other night. She lived on the top floor. Each time after catching my breath, I would tell her about my life.

  “Elizabeth, did I mention to you that I visited 52 East
118th Street? I was curious to see if a former client of mine was still living there. Gabriela Blanco. While I was in the neighborhood, I also visited the Meleta Marquez Family Center. I arranged for hot meals to be delivered to East Harlem families from 124th Street all the way down to 97th Street.”

  “What made you decide on that particular area? And who is Gabriela Blanco?”

  “That area was the territory that I covered when I did casework in Harlem. Fifty-two is one building I’ll never forget. That holds true for Gabriela Blanco as well.”

  Fifty-two East 118th Street. Fifty-two! It was the most ravaged building on my route. Probably in all East Harlem. A week doesn’t go by that I don’t think of Gabriela Blanco. She was thirteen years old, eight months pregnant. She had a sweet face, tulip lips. It was somewhere around Christmas time, circa 1970. I was doing my job. Making field visits. Evaluating client needs. Trying to help. I ended up at 52. I was on the top floor of the walk-up.

  In those days, I didn’t huff and puff when I climbed stairs. I was standing in the hallway with Gabby Blanco, proud, actually beaming, because she had just finished telling me, “I heard you, Mr. Lazar. I’m going to return to school after I have my baby, Mr. Lazar. I’m determined to change my life.” We were standing in the hallway when two addicts came out of nowhere. They began shooting at one another. Gabby and I were in their crossfire. A third male was also there. He was inebriated, started laughing as he watched the commotion. I lifted my field book to my chest. But Gabriela didn’t have a book. Bullets sprayed the hallway for what seemed like the time it takes for the Red Sox and the Yankees to complete a game. The gunfire was short-lived. Both men cut out. Ran down the stairs. Disappeared. Gabby wasn’t hit...or was she? She gave me a look that said, “There ain’t no hope.” She then entered her grandmother’s railroad flat and slammed the door. The inebriated spectator had been struck by a bullet. His chest was gushing blood. I raced to his side. Took out my handkerchief to press against his wound. In seconds, my handkerchief turned completely red. I took off my belt and used it as a tourniquet. “Don’ fuck with me, whitey!” he said. “I might be beer drunk but I ain’t H high. Besides, my old lady will be here any minute. She’s taking me to the Joint Disease Hospital. I have a date with the electrolysis machine over there. Got two

  bad kidneys.”

  “The thing is, Liz. I was already a veteran caseworker by then. I took it all in stride. Quickly leapt down the flights of stairs two at a time. Reached the street. Headed for the nearest subway thinking that I must remind Debbie Turner to make sure to always carry her black field book with her when she goes to the field. That thought hit me because I noticed a bullet embedded deep in my thick field book.” I peered at Elizabeth.

  She had the same gaga look that Debbie Turner had that day at the Welfare Department when I assisted that woman in the intake section.

  “Did you find Gabriela Blanco?”

  “Yes, I did. Just about nothing left of her. She had five children. Three of them are in prison. The other two are twins. They left New York City when they were in their teens and got involved in the drug business. They’re somewhere in Los Angles. Gabriela said that they are doing okay as far as she knows, but she hardly ever hears from them. That’s as much as she told me. What’s even sadder is that she’s still receiving public assistance.”

  “Elizabeth, Amy Cho was the only woman I had a long-term relationship with who still likes me.”

  “David, now you’re exaggerating.”

  “Did I tell you that Amy’s getting married? After all these years of being alone, she’s finally found someone. I’m happy for her.”

  “So am I, David. I honestly mean that. Amy sounds like the kind of woman who didn’t get much out of life. I’m glad for her.”

  Elizabeth and I started having dinner together every night. As far as I was concerned, Elizabeth needed me. Every now and then, I couldn’t help myself from showing off.

  “Swan Lake was a big flop in 1877, Elizabeth. It wasn’t until Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov choreographed it anew that Swan Lake became what we know today. For your birthday next week, I’d like to take you to see Swan Lake at the Met.”

  We became friends, best friends.

  “You’re my closest friend, David. I must ask you something important. Right now, I’m scared of going further. Does that bother you?”

  Whenever Elizabeth asked direct questions like that I froze. I was sixty-two-years old. A four-time loser. Elizabeth was half my age. I felt I had very little to offer. What would I say if she told me she wanted to have children? And I felt that if I came on too strong, Elizabeth would run away. I tried to downplay my feelings. I didn’t have the courage to go after her full throttle.

  “David, I might be thirty years your junior, but let me tell you this, you’re a very complex man. And in some ways, I’m beginning to think you’re a coward.”

  Talking is good. Talking is great. Talking with the right person is just about everything. I’d climb those six flights almost every night. And even though I was in generally excellent health, I had a hard time climbing those stairs. By the time I reached Elizabeth’s door, I’d be about ready to collapse. I think that was something Elizabeth liked about me from the get-go: how much of a he-man I wasn’t.

  Every time I was with Elizabeth, I spilled out more truths. Not that I claim any eloquent insights. Elizabeth had the real acumen. Certainly, more common sense and groundedness than I had ever had.

  During her early years, she was home-schooled by her mother. She later went to a middle school that graduated only sixty-two percent of its senior class. Then she went on to the University of Tulsa, but that’s not what’s important. No more so than Elizabeth being a Presbyterian.

  Elizabeth Dunn is a witch. There isn’t anything I ever say to her that she doesn’t grasp before I am able to finish the sentence. There isn’t a novel that I recommend that she doesn’t immediately read and immediately comprehend. There is never a conversation that we ever had to which she doesn’t add something super-discerning and insightful: from women should have equal pay to civil rights issues to why she believes that Justice Ginsburg is the most liberal judge on the Supreme Court to who’s going to win an Oscar to why Oklahoma is the greatest American musical of the twentieth century. All these years with Elizabeth and I’m still advising everyone we meet that when my wife expresses an opinion, she’ll always back it up with an earful of intelligent reasons. And when she talks about the musical Oklahoma, she’ll sing the Laurey Williams role as if she were Shirley Jones.

  “Tell me more about your mother,” she said one night.

  I did, and as sometimes happened when I spoke to Elizabeth about my mother, my eyes welled up.

  I told Elizabeth that I had done unforgivable things, but the one thing that haunted me most was not being there at the end of my mother’s life.

  “You must think of me as an a-hole, and perhaps I am. I admit at times that I am unencumbered by values or conscience, but not all the time. I could rationalize by telling you that traffic being what it is in Manhattan, a yellow taxi would’ve been bumper-to-bumper from Columbus Circle to Madison and 59th Street, then going north for thirty-six blocks, it would have taken a lifetime.

  “When my father telephoned me that day, it was 2:45 P.M. I had made the trip to the hospital dozens of times, and it takes a minimum of forty-six minutes to get to Sinai. ‘Fatty’ died at 3:01 P.M. You figure the percentages. It was NO BET.”

  Years later I would tell people about my cold heartedness. Nathan Rubin cackled dry and shrill. “I’ll tell you Sonny, I was an orphan. I don’t know much about that kind of stuff.” Solomon Lepidus grunted. “I know it was a case money bet for you, Davy boy, but still, it was your mom.” Amy Cho turned white, said nothing. Debbie Turner exclaimed, “I don’t understand you—” Leslie said, “If it were my mother, I would have done the same thing.”

 
Elizabeth said, “You were a different man back then.”

  I wanted to tell Elizabeth my bottom-line truths. Not what friends, family members, and others believed, but what and who I was. I wanted to spell out the vicious things I had done.

  Confess.

  Every time I climbed those arduous stairs to the top floor, I wanted to.

  Every time I reached her door and took a deep breath, I was about to.

  Every time I entered Liz’s apartment, I knew what I wanted to say.

  During our first year together, I didn’t speak in much detail about my handicapping exploits. Most of my experiences were too damn toxic.

  “Bruno collected, Davey boy...” Solomon Lepidus removed his thick glasses. “What the hell, Davey boy! Stop being a choirboy. Ressler’s fortunate that’s all he did!”

  Solomon Lepidus stopped speaking. It was time for me to stop asking questions.

  “I take full responsibility for that part of my life, Elizabeth. The truth is handicapping and making illegal money were never things I was proud of. One good paragraph I write is worth all the dollars I made gambling.”

  “David! I’m not upset. I’m trying to think of your handicapping prowess as a special gift. Like a boy being six foot ten at fifteen. That boy has a chance of being a hoop star if he applies himself.”

  So, I had a small gift. I applied it to handicapping. Made money. Not by today’s standards, of course. Today, those one percenters are involved in billion dollar deals.

  “What I wanted to tell you, Liz, is that it was rough when I lived with my parents. Even today, I can still see my mom’s purple blotches from diabetes.”

  “David, I’m sorry to interrupt you but would you mind if I made some suggestions about the novel you’ve been working on? I’ve read the first hundred pages. I think no one is going to read it unless you give it a more coherent chronology. You must tell your story with a linear construction and connect the dots so it’ll make perfect sense to the reader. Otherwise, the reader will get lost.”